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TECH NEWS
strava leaderboard no longer free - 19 may 2020Strava changes: Will you be paying the price?
So, Strava has scrapped its Premium/Summit packages in favour of making the majority of its features a paid-for service. There are also API changes that look set to wreak havoc with third-party app access. But how will these changes affect the average Strava user? And should you be coughing up the £4 per month?
First things first, Strava remains free if you want it to be. A free user will still have the ability to upload rides, see past rides and communicate with friends. But segment leaderboards will now be limited to the top 10, and the gap between free and paid services is the biggest that we’ve seen from Strava.
Here are those changes
We've got a round-up of your reactions here
If it's not on Strava....
....it's because you didn't pay for it.
— Daniel Lloyd (@daniellloyd1) May 18, 2020
Getting people to pay for previously free features isn’t easy. Especially when they’re good.
This isn’t a problem that is exclusive to Strava. We’re seeing it across many other sites and also across other industries like gaming. When you create a feature that is very good and allow people to use it for free for years, making it profitable without selling your users to ad companies means asking the users to contribute.
Strava is taking the decision to monetise its product by asking users to pay for the majority of it, rather than selling the eyes of those users to advertisers. It’s also a move that sees it step away from the Premium/Summit memberships that offered some pretty minor performance-based features on top of the fully-featured basic site.
So why has Strava suddenly changed its business model? In the past, Strava has looked to use its giant dataset as a way to generate revenue, and one theory is that new privacy laws such as GDPR and California's Consumer Privacy Act may have impacted its ability to collect and sell data. On the advertising revenue question, Strava has pointed out that it has a relatively small staff of 180 people. Simply, it says, "implementing ads would take away from the time we could spend making Strava better for athletes."
A big update to routes is on the way
The ability to create routes has become one of the paid-for features, though free users can still download and view their previously created routes and routes from others. The changes that are coming transfer many of the features that were recently launched on the mobile version.
These include personalised route recommendations and the ability to see the type of surface that you'll be riding on, based on data from user's bike choices across segments on your route.
There is also the ability to send a route straight to a Wahoo device and improved, if still not perfect integration with Garmin devices.
Segments are getting a refresh
Arguably, Strava would be nothing without its segments. The popularity of chasing KoMs, virtually racing your mates, and comparing your times to those of the pros is a major feature that allowed Strava to grow.
This is where Strava is bound to have upset the biggest number of people, as free users will now only get access to the top 10 of each segment. That’s fine if you can regularly break into the top 10, but for the majority of riders, one of the core features that makes Strava so popular is now mostly useless unless you upgrade.
1st world issues today. £1000+ bikes✅, £200+ trainers✅, Netflix✅, Amazon Prime✅, NowTV✅, £50-£200 race entry✅, Cheap medal and t-shirt✅, Sprint 1/4 mile sections for Kudos✅, etc, etc...
Pay £4 a month for Strava❌.
How very dare you start charging to pay people's wages! pic.twitter.com/hJTWxNNMgQ
— Mark Highland (@Lost_Pirate21) May 19, 2020
Some may see this as an annoyance, but we’re all happy to pay for digital services like Spotify, Netflix and Amazon Prime etc. Should Strava be any different? Especially when you consider that the segments and leaderboards are processor-intensive and therefore expensive features to run. Others will be hoping that segments becoming a premium feature will lead to some much-needed rationalisation of the system: any half-popular route now has hundreds of intersecting and conflicting segments. Perhaps the subs money will pay for some much-needed pruning and moderation.
The hidden API issues
Lurking beneath the shiny Strava homepage are some pretty significant API changes that could pose serious problems for apps that use your Strava data to do cool things. A huge number of third-party apps won’t be working this morning and few will have received any sort of warning.
If you're not sure what API is, it's a set of functions allowing the creation of applications that access the features or data of an operating system, application, or website. Strava's API used to allow third-party apps to access leaderboard, segment, user and other data with the third-party app displaying this data in a different way.
Relive: Strava just broke up with us
We’ve seen Strava move the goalposts in the past. Relive.cc suffered massively when Strava shut down Relive’s access to ride data. You can still create Relive videos if you have a Garmin or a Wahoo computer, but the lack of integration with Strava has added a barrier that many won’t even attempt to get through.
One of the main users of Strava data, Veloviewer, will now be reliant on its users also being paid-up Strava users for some headline features to continue to function. While Veloviewer says that many of its users pay for Strava already, it’s an extra cost if you've already paid Veloviewer your tenner but had no interest in paying for Strava.
Try before you buy
Thankfully, Strava is allowing us 60-days to try the new changes for free before making a choice.
If Strava can ensure that the system runs smoothly, and truly improve the service for its users, without some of the annoying features (we like our feeds chronological, thanks) and bugs, then £4 per month isn't a bad price to pay for a service free from ads. It's certainly something that we've considered.
There’s a way to avoid getting annoyed by the changes to Strava - DON’T USE IT. I can’t think of a serious athlete that judges their athletic ability by beating Graham between the traffic lights at Lidl and the turning to Church Lane. Let race results do the talking
— Chris Adams (@gingeadams) May 19, 2020
Or, you know, you could just go old skool and just ride your bike…
Strava got in touch to strongly deny that GDPR had any effect on their business model. A spokesperson for Strava said; "Subscription has always been the heart of Strava making up the vast majority of our revenue, and recent privacy regulations haven’t influenced our model. We did not sell personal information before, and we do not sell it now.”
Latest Comments
- chrisonabike 1 sec ago
Time for the annual visibility campaign post: https://waronthemotorist.wordpress.com/2017/10/28/new-road-safety-campai... If it saves one bollard...
- OldRidgeback 24 min 44 sec ago
It doesn't seem to be the most efficient piece of design. But I don't see why the police should bother about it, given that it's highly unlikely to...
- chrisonabike 25 min 8 sec ago
Now now - be fair! I think it also means "...and I might get a nasty shock when I fling open my door and hop out onto the 'pavement' without...
- chrisonabike 49 min 9 sec ago
Have addicts been reduced to baartering for drugs?
- lesterama 50 min 31 sec ago
It was only the Euros, after all - and some epic racing across the categories
- HoarseMann 57 min 17 sec ago
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crr97dl4740o Mother and child escaped unharmed; unclear who was driving.
- mark1a 10 hours 5 min ago
I understand what you're saying, but I think when you get north of £10k, for the average amateur road.cc reader who maybe in the market for a so...
- brooksby 4 hours 53 min ago
They (wheelywheely) haven't been seen for ages- did they get banned?
- ktache 14 hours 34 min ago
For double that you can' get a Pedro's vise whip Ii. Or half, the reportedly excellent decathlon thingy. And Sigma has the Silca for only £150.
- KDee 14 hours 40 min ago
I'm no detective, but the "NOAHFAST" decal vertically stickered on the headtube is a little bit of a clue.
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60 comments
Happy to pay for it when they fix the now 2-year old bug that prevents Strava calories syncing with Apple Health. It was working before they changed something and there's a support thread with hundreds of replies... total silence from Strava.
If you sign up for Google opinion rewards you get paid small amounts of Google play credit for answering very short surveys periodically, over the course of a year you can easily build enough credit to pay for a years subscription to strava, that's how I've been paying for a number of years.
Looking into paying the subscription. It's asking me for £6.99 a month?! Long way of £4. Anyone else had this?
I pay £6.50 a month for Strava. I think I am a premium or summit member. Not really sure. I just wanted live segments and the training data etc. But since these new changes, the mobile app has locked me out of the leaderboards and urges me to subscribe. Despite that, I can still see all the premium features on my PC. It doesn't seem very well managed.
£48/Year is a lot of you just want to check your segments against your historical data after a ride. Send to me a basic member option for £1/month would get a lot more paying for that and then the premium members who are serious about training pay more.
Fees killed friends reunited
No, I think it's Facebook that killed Friends (though it was a bit crap anyway).
If £1 a week is too expensive for you then I suspect you don't really value the service they provide. Every user seems to have their own idea of what is good value, poor value; which features are worth paying for and which are not; that bugs not being fixed means they will end their sub... It's all a bit pathetic really.
Other online services are available. And people managed to go cycling, running and walking perfectly well before Strava and, if you can believe it, even before the internet.
It's not the cost of one of these things by itself, it's all of them together. A few quid for Strava here, a few quid for Netflix there. Then Spotify, then Amazon prime, then Microsoft 365 ... etc etc etc. It doesn't take long to rack up a pretty hefty monthly outgoing.
And the question is how much of what that gives you do you actually use, and how much is that worth to you.
I only really use segments. Is that worth £4 a month to me? Maybe ... but it's nowhere near a necessity, so can I be bothered to subscribe just for that? If it was £2 a month for that and another £2 a month for the rest ... Yeah I'd take the segments without a second thought.
You may think that's "pathetic" but who cares? It's about the value to me. If Strava want to maximise their income I would speculate they'd be a lot better off offering a more basic level package that many more people would take up without thinking about it, plus the £4 a month for those who actually use all the rest.
True but none of those is essential, and neither are takeaways, beer, even cake but everyone finds money for the things they want.
Subscription services don't usually charge per function or let you pick and choose. Microsoft doesn't have pricing for only using Word and Excel but not Powerpoint, Outlook etc. The local gym doesn't charge less because you only use 11 stations out of 18. How many Netflix programs can you watch on the free version?
Whether you or I agree with Strava's decisions (or even their reasons) is irrelevant; they are the ones running the company. You either value it enough to pay for the extra functionality or you don't.
Well actually, Microsoft will charge you extra if you want to use anything beyond the basic offering (Visio, say), sports centres often have different rates depending on what combination of gym, pool, squash courts, etc. you want to use, and Netflix will (normally) charge you different amounts depending on whether you get SD, HD, 4K.
Agreed that it's up to Strava to decide what way of packaging and pricing their offering best suits their business model, though.
I'm a bit confused. I paid my £47.99 at the end of April for Summit or premium or whatever it's called, and now I'm being asked to pay £4 a month, after finding functionality hobbled in the app. So what did I pay £47.99 for?
Your post encouraged me to look at my account. I took one element of Summit. I recently got the other elements added in (no extra payment).
Currently it says.......
Your annual membership will automatically renew on 5 February 2021 for £18.99
Your next bill will be on 5 February 2021 for £18.99
I'll see how long that lasts.
Didn't know you could select bits of the subscription for cheaper. I just subscribed all in as I figured I use it so often, it's only fair I put some money into it.
It seems to have sorted itself out now - my account status has changed from 'free' to 'annual' - must've been a temporary database sort of issue.
I used to be a 'Premium" [or whatever they called it ] member back when there was only one paid choice. I gave that up when they dropped Google Maps and replaced it with the inferior matchbox open streetmap. Then they changed to three premium choices, none of which gave me reason to re-adopt a paying priviledge. After that was the change to the activity algorithm so that I needed a 3rd party app to regain chronological functionality. The Facebook-like ability to post pictures of your cat was the next useless 'enhancement'. And now it's back to only one paid option. Again....
I don't mind Strava trying to make a buck, and wish them well, but to get me back will take more than the loss of leaderboards. Maybe I'll miss that, but I don't think so... I only use Strava for the social interplay.
Bottom line is they keep messing with it: what you pay for today you may not get tomorrow. Until they get some stability, I'll stick with reliable apps that I'm willing to pay a premium membership for - Ride with GPS, Komoot.
Always amazed by how many people get angry at Facebook and google doing dreadful things with their data while also refusing to pay for apps. Either pay for a service or you end up becoming the product with all the issues that come with it.
I live in London- if Strava encourages me to do one journey to work month on my bike I break even, a return journey and I've saved money.
I think it has more to do with the lack of transparency around what they do with the data and the impact it has, for example the Cambridge Analytica thing. And of course Facebook don't even offer an alternative option since those who would pay for privacy are precisely the one's whose data they prize most.
I think Strava are choosing the better way, but not sure they will succeed for all that. The ignorance at the heart of the FB model is free and in good supply!
I'm a fat old cyclist and I already pay for Strava. It gives me the ability to assess my ride data which in turn allows me to set training goals that are readily measurable using strava. I don't race and measure myself against my historical performance; in that way I have a clear indicator of progress. The fees are negligible and the time taken to write this post is probably more expensive than the subscription. The segment stuff is of minor interest as realising I'm 1293rd quickest up a local hill isn't going to change my behaviour. Seeing my improvement is.
180 staff, 50 millions users (and adding 1m more per 30 days from Strava's own quote in Feb 2020) and Premium is $60 a year. so even if 1 in a 1000 paid for existing premium then there's already $30m p/a in the kitty to pay for server maintenance and payroll. Smacks of shareholders and/or greed to me.
Are Strava currently making a profit?
They say that they aren't.
Trying to make a profit is hardly greedy.
Have you ever tried to run a business? Based on this, I doubt it. And you've obviously never seen the cost of server and bandwidth costs for a globally popular online resource.
If shareholders bother you then I guess you boycott Amazon, Microsoft and Google. And supermarkets. And what about hotels, airlines and the scandal of the UK's privatised water, gas, electricity, rail and bus companies? All are run for shareholder profit.
It's amazing how many people are so upset that such a complex, clever online facility is now charging for more aspects of its functionality. Meanwhile they post on instagram with an iphone about their new carbon wheels and reflect wistfully on how they should have been on another trip to Mallorca with all their mates this month.
this
There are several reasons I use Strava:
1) To see what mates are doing
2) If I get a top 10 then I may try for a KOM or better position
3) As an easy to see record of my training
4) The Route Maker
It appears that I only stand to lose the Route maker so if that is so I shall continue with the free, I use Golden Cheetah for serious analysis anyway.
The reason I will not pay for Strava is mainly for one reason only and that is the stupid system whereby if you equal a KOM then they announce that you have it to all who see your ride, you are listed as joint number 1 and yet it does not appear on your list of KOM's in your profile. I realise that may seem a trivial reason and I only treat KOM's as a bit of fun but nevertheless people put a lot of effort into getting a KOM and so want it listed, yet desipte years of people complaining Strava refuse to do what must be a simple fix. If you are on a group ride and two of you get an equal KOM then it is the first person to submit that gets it. If its free I will put up with that, if I am paying then I want it fixed.
"3) As an easy to see record of my training"
You're in for a nasty surprise, then, as the Training Log is going behind the paywall as well. Segments Leaderboards is the sexy news story, but I believe the Training Log move is really the bigger deal. It's going to be interesting to see whether they grandfather access to previous data or not.
I don't like them taking Segments Leaderboards and Segment Analysis behind the paywall, but I totally undestand it. Segments is their reason d'etre, and they probably should have been monetizing it more all along. Training Log, though? That bothers me. In the most techincal sense, I understand that nobody is owed anything for free. But when you offer, or even solicit, to host somebody's history gratis, the implication is that you will continue to allow free access to that history. Strava are within their rights to later ask people to pay to continue to access it, but that feels like a far bigger breach of trust to me than making detailed Segment information part of the subscription service.
That will be a shame but I can live without it. The thing with segments is that while they are free it can be claimed that you are THE fastest on that segment, at least since Strava became popular and for all intents and purposes you are indeed THE fastest. Make that paid only and it then means you are the fastest amongst those that pay for the service so it perhaps won't have the same level of interest even for those who pay.
I don't think you're understanding it ... the non-payers will still be ON the segment leaderboards, they just won't be able to SEE them apart from the top 10.
Initially I was concerned that free users would be locked out of competeing for segments, thus reducing the total number of competitors, but I'm relieved to see that everyone can still compete for free. I do wonder if a free user will be able to see if they are just outside the top 10. Will they still be able to see their time?
From what I have read so far, it appears that you will still see your own time and position, along with the top 10.
Sorry for the duplicate, I appear to be getting an error when posting, so hit the Save button to try again. Both clicks produced the error, but it seems that both posted successfully.
Something for road.cc to look into methinks.
Just checked and it shows my time, but not position (which is definitely not in the top ten).
I sometimes like to compare a quick time with my previous efforts, but I won't be able to now without spending some cash. Personally, I'm happy to fritter 50 quid on bike bits (or computer bits or board games or expensive rum come to that), but I have an aversion to paying for software so I'll just live with the free Strava. It shows my PRs so I can at least tell if I've gone quicker than before.
I don't use Strava, never really felt it offers what I want. Just seemed to be about segment times, at least that is the only thing you really see comments about. I just want to track my rides and plan new routes, so ridewithgps is great for me, and I pay the subscription for that because I make use of it and I don't see why it should be given to me for free. If you use Strava then why expect it for free?
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